Winter cat photos

We are having exceptionally small amount of snow this time of year, but there are some shots from current winter season I have managed to take, despite lack of light, under there is around 5 hours of daylight, but even during brightest hour it is quite dark, especially when it's cloudy.















Any other cats out there that are not afraid of snow and ice or cold and wet?

Beautiful cats, beautiful pictures, and one with all four feet off the ground. Give yourself a BIG pat on the back for this series.

JTbo said:

Any other cats out there that are not afraid of snow and ice or cold and wet?

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Great photos. Your cats are beautiful! 

Oliver wouldn't know what to do with himself. He's still curious about the sink faucet and a wet bathtub after we get out of the shower, and he gets a little spazzy when water gets on his fur from either! 

:lol3: Love it!
The amount of green there is not what I would imagine for Finland in winter! Your turn for a light winter maybe. The weather everywhere seems all messed up.
Your cats are gorgeous and fluffy. I bet they love getting outside. Mine are a lot more wussy this time of year. We take them out on the nicer days, but they usually only want to stay out a few minutes.

pushylady said:

:lol3: Love it!
The amount of green there is not what I would imagine for Finland in winter! Your turn for a light winter maybe. The weather everywhere seems all messed up.
Your cats are gorgeous and fluffy. I bet they love getting outside. Mine are a lot more wussy this time of year. We take them out on the nicer days, but they usually only want to stay out a few minutes.

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Weather has been indeed very good for time of the year, heating bill is easier to cope with

This photo I'm two minds from, in a way it is good, but it still is missing a bit as I could not get his target in to photo and it is not much of winter showing in that one, however one can see how perfect colors that cat has for spring and autumn, he just blends in to surroundings:


I'm shooting with ISO1600-ISO3200 because of low light with cheap D3100 Nikon, but as I have now learned tricks that camera needs, noise is not much of issue with this size photos. All shots are taken handheld without support as I find support and tripod to be too slow to keep up with them, black cat next to tree was shot 1/125s with 185mm and I was surprised how well it came out.

We did have some snow earlier, but only took pics with my low quality pocket cam, it was not quite up the job, but with that camera it is easier to get pics from them:


This one is quite dark even camera did use flash, but still I somehow like how it catches the moment:


I'm glad that you like from these photos, as there will be more light now every day until Summer, I hope to get better shots taken from them, also maybe with bit more snow, especially I still miss a shot where they send snow flying high as the fool around, fingers crossed that there is enough luck for such shot

Wonderful pix!  You're making me rethink my desire for the Nikon 5200.  Yours shot on a 3100 are really good and the quality is similar to the one I wanted.  Of course, a good lens, steady hand  and more than anything else, a good eye for composition help!

The first pic is perfect. Cat fully in the air, front paws starting to come forward into catch position, back paws recoiling from the leap, and tail curved off to one side affecting the trajectory of the leap. You have a very high talent with that camera. It is a photo that National Geographic photographers would be proud of.

I am going to add it to my wallpaper collection, with your permission. I have about 30 from different members that I rotate weekly. It will never be re-posted or anything that would violate your copyright.

catspaw66 said:

The first pic is perfect. Cat fully in the air, front paws starting to come forward into catch position, back paws recoiling from the leap, and tail curved off to one side affecting the trajectory of the leap. You have a very high talent with that camera. It is a photo that National Geographic photographers would be proud of.

I am going to add it to my wallpaper collection, with your permission. I have about 30 from different members that I rotate weekly. It will never be re-posted or anything that would violate your copyright.

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By all means, do so, if my photo will bring enjoyment, then I consider it a success

sivyaleah, get 5200, it is far easier to get same level shots with it as with D3100 this quality is only possible by lot of tweaking of settings, especially jpeg is useless, one can only shoot raw, with modified picture control and noise reduction off. I don't know why some settings affect raw photos too, but so it is.

My lens is Tamron 70-300mm 1:4-5.6 LD Di, very cheap one and autofocus stops working randomly with D3100, so sometimes I miss shots, sometimes I have to use manual focus, but tens of thousands photos in a year are teaching how to get by with limitations and recently I have learned to capture more of the moment instead seeking that perfect technical photo, but there is lot for me to learn still.

Most photos also needs bit of retouching too, to get most of them, I use mostly Irfan view and View NX and I do not much else than bit of light and color adjusting, most shots come under exposed because of conditions, also after scaling down tiny bit of sharpening is needed, but camera is not as bad as I thought after first year I got it, it just took bit longer to learn my way around with it than it took with D40.

If I find my today's snow photos any good I post them later for your enjoyment

JTbo said:

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If I find my today's snow photos any good I post them later for your enjoyment

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    Yes please :-D  Your photos and your cats are wonderful, esp. those catching their action, and that four paw jump in the air that you caught is brilliant! 

I love that last one of your black kitty in the snow because the shape and expression are almost identical to a fluffy toy cat I was given for my birthday a long time ago:  I called him Jenkins.  I kept him close until I was able to bring a real cat in to my home.

Here is one that has not been edited at all, only rescaling, I forgot again white balance to auto, so it is too blue, but I like the pic:


Here is same photo with few quick fixes, ready to put to wall:


Not every shot comes out well, here autofocus failed to track black cat in rather dark light, so it was bit failure, but still one can make out that crazy expression he has:


This one was quite happy today:


This one was a lot of crazy, quite a stare there:


Took photos bit too late, so I had more than usual issues with autofocusing it seems, not many shots came out ok, lot less than 10% actually, but even some pro's say 30% would be good ratio, tip is to take more photos, much easier to get few ok photos than attempting to make every photo to be good, I guess that is only hope for my poor level, but more practice will of course help

Just hoping to get bit of sun for next photos.

To my novice eye I would say the first shot was lovely and what do you mean about the blue and then I see it fixed and go WOW!  

Your black cat's expressions are hilarious. 

What kind of cats do you have? Their fur looks very thick and their tails very plush, but that may of course just be that they have grown for your colder weather.

I like the unedited photo better. But then, I always preferred Ectachrome to Kodachrome. I liked the blue cast better than the red.

What great pictures.  Loved them all.

MServant said:

To my novice eye I would say the first shot was lovely and what do you mean about the blue and then I see it fixed and go WOW!  

Your black cat's expressions are hilarious. 

What kind of cats do you have? Their fur looks very thick and their tails very plush, but that may of course just be that they have grown for your colder weather.

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They are domestic short hair and medium hair, but brown one for example has similar tail to long hair, but rest is closer to short hair than medium hair, black one is closest to short hair and one with mostly white is medium hair.

I have also two indoor long hairs and one short hair.

They all are feral origins and I got them 6 months to 4 years age, they had no human contact during those first months, so socializing has been bit more of challenge. Only three is enough socialized that I can let them outdoors.

Here is one long hair one, brother of that other white/brown cat, before capturing, fixing and socializing few years ago, that was around 3 feet of snow, that cat is actually quite large one in size, but also very scared of everything, except walking on top of my chest when I'm attempting to sleep long :


This is smallest one, also long hair, she has not grown much after 6 months or so, she, black one and brown one are from same litter that had got their mother shot and all of them were just skin and bone and needed lot of care.


Here she is how she came, just skin and bone:


Brown and black one were like this when I rescued them, I suspected that they were 6 months old there, but can be younger too, hard to tell for me, but they were in very poor condition, 5 in total, one didn't make it, one found another home and three unplanned additions to my cat family just did happen.


This one bites quite fast and hard, lived 4 years without human contact, but has been now few years indoors and has adopted quite well, but still lot of work needed with her. Loves to play with string when I'm at other end, but I learned hard way how she can't be forced to take medicine, still have the scars which I will carry rest of my life for being foolish one.

What a wonderful transformation in their health, well done you!  Truely inspiring to see such a difference, and so important I am sure for these cats to survive in their home climate where you are.    That top cat is a very fine example of a ball of fur!    

Looks like they  had a good time

What little snow there was, it is gone already, only few spots here and there where piles used to be, very warm for January (even at August some nights were colder), but it is all the better for cats and my heating bill.

Every time they get out, they go to love mode and purr, bump their heads, rub their sides, tangle their tails, it is good time to take some photos:

Sadly, that is again ISO3200 shot taken 1:22pm or 13:22 which ever format is use in your location. 1/125s, f/6.3, 98mm. Flash set to extremely low and rear shutter might been good there, however that would of spooked them, so I could not quite get details to black fur or even to edge of face and chin to show up.

With snow on ground, it is bit easier to work with low light, without snow shadows are quite strong even when it is cloudy and it is hard to get details show in black cat.

If anyone is interested, this is the lens I'm using and guy doing the review is correct with every point he makes from it, for example today most of times when I attempted to take picture automatic focusing just did not do anything as it was too dark or some other unknown reason:

Ideally I would shoot with 1/250 - 1/500s f/8 - f/11, ISO100-400, but it is possibly only during the summer and maybe at late winter too when there is (maybe) snow and great amount of sun.

Nikkor 55-200mm VR should be a lot better lens and that is what I will get next whenever I may have funds for such.

Another tips that popped to my mind are that get to cat's level, crouched position is where I mostly take pics from cats, also they are not as shy as if I would be standing, spend lot of time with camera among cats, as I have lens hood, I have let bravest one to cheek rub against lens hood, it will mark good scent there, soon others will do the same and then camera is not object that they bother themselves with, it is tagged as part of their world and then they are more relaxed and play more when I'm around with the camera.

Also don't lift camera suddenly, but keep it close to shooting position most of the time, smooth movements without any sudden movements as sudden movements cause them to stop and examine nature and reason of sudden movement.

Managed to partly save this shot, one can almost feel that what is coming next when looking at this shot, only thing was that there did not come anything next, they just walked to different directions, until bit later they decided it was good time to have a little chase around:

Here is my grandma's cat Skunky in the winter time. I don't have any good winter ones of my kitties at the moment.

What a beautiful picture @taylerhill.  I love the light and dark in the snow, and the sky is fantastic.  Of course the cat is the highlight, as always.